Something Wicked This Way Comes

Mr. Dark (Jonathan Pryce) brings his traveling carnival to a small Midwestern town and grants wishes, for a price.

Something Wicked This Way Comes

Parental Guide

Book-based '80s movie about an evil carnival is scary.

Consumerism

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Drinking, drugs, & smoking

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Language

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Positive messages

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Positive role models

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Sex

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Violence

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Parents need to know that Disney's 1983 horror-fantasy movie Something Wicked This Way Comes is scary the way The Wizard of Oz is scary, but it makes far less sense than Oz, which actually makes it far scarier. An evil carnival comes to town with the apparent goal to kill, destroy, or otherwise corrupt all the town's good people. Expect lots of ominous lightning and thunder, talk of death, regret, and fathers disappointing their sons. Kids run in terror. Boys are attacked by hundreds of tarantulas, a scenario that turns out to be a nightmare. A man is tortured with electric shocks. A bad guy is electrocuted to death until nothing is left of him but a shriveled skeleton. A copy of Will's bloody head falls out of the sky, and a beautiful woman suddenly looks like Frankenstein. "Hell" and "damnation" are uttered.